Chris Hobbs

Retired Metropolitan Police Officer

Born and raised in Hackney. Served for 32 years in the Met. Worked extensively within the Asian community as Special Branch officer in the 80's and 90's. Was presented with a ceremonial sword by the UK's largest Sikh temple shortly after retirement.
About one-third of my service involved border controls in both the UK and Jamaica. Over an eight year period I spent a total of 18 months undertaking a series of deployments to Jamaica. Trustee of a small charity that enables some Jamaican children from the poorest backgrounds to remain in education.
Policing interests include football related violence, extremism, gang, knife, gun & drugs crime and borders. Hobbies are football DJ'ing & 'commenting' for various media outlets on policing/border issues.

How was it that on your watch, despite terrorist incidents across Europe and the world including the Nairobi Westgate Shopping Centre massacre and the Lee Rigby murder, all of which sent shudders through our police service, armed officer numbers declined. Even in 2015 with the Paris <em>Charlie Hebdo</em> atrocity and the massacre of mainly English nationals at Souse, you still sat on your hands as numbers of British armed police reduced still further.

Issues around border controls linked to terrorism, 'traditional' criminality, migration, immigration, national security and even queueing times should, as far as is possible, be in the public domain especially around election time. Delaying or redacting reports other than in extreme circumstance where there is a real risk to national security, is cheating the electorate. It's as simple as that.

The grief felt by rank and file officers will be accompanied by a renewed realisation that the tragedy could provide a springboard for other zealots to create mayhem and that officers, now more thinly spread than ever, could be vulnerable especially outside the major cities. The death of a brave officer in the most heavily policed area of the UK will indeed be a cause for concern.

Doubtless both the 'Remainers and Brexiteers' will ignore the very real issues stated above while, if asked to comment, the Home Office will produce its usual bland spin along the lines of; 'the Home Office is committed to strong borders and we are confident we have the resources to cope with all eventualities post Brexit.'

Perhaps the biggest, almost unnoticed compliment paid to the police came as the popular Rampage sound system was closing. The DJ's, who had exercised a remarkable degree of control over a large and boisterous crowd, put a 'shout out' for the officers of the Metropolitan Police. Praise indeed.

Police across the United Kingdom have reacted with a mixture of sorrow, anger and a huge degree of foreboding to events in Dallas, Nice, Baton Rouge and Munich. As each of these tragedies unfolded and as word reaches them of further incidents such as those at Wurzburg, Ansbach and now Saint-Etienne-Du-Rouvray, they will be asking themselves: 'What if.'

Explain why, Home Secretary, that when you make your constant references to police transgressions, you don't balance this by referring to the fact that the number of officers involved are but an infinitesimal speck when set against the tens of thousands of officers who have served or are serving since the 1980s?

We will of course never know whether the presence of experienced Merseyside football spotters would have resulted in those officers being able to alert the match commander of potential impending disaster

The Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) report on the use of force by police could have been headed "Ours is the Most Restrained Police Service in the World And Will Strive to Improve Still Further." Of course they didn't; instead we saw the IPCC attempting to justify their beleaguered existence and ingratiate itself with a public who, like front line police officers, distrusts them. The result; a morale damaging report on the police use of force.

In London the simple fact is that the armed police 'jam' does not cover the slice of bread that is one of the world's major cities and does not even begin to lightly smear much of the loaf that is the UK. Meanwhile, the increase announced by the government in the numbers of MI5, MI6 and GCHQ officers together with increased funding is a bittersweet pill for struggling police officers on the front line to swallow...

Whatever merits that may have been perceived in Theresa May's speech, the assertion that the policing front line has been 'preserved' is arrant nonsense. The dramatic reduction in both mounted and dog units is huge blow to those on the front line as is the reduction in helicopter cover.

As the cuts bite and more issues of this nature emerge, they will provide a feeding frenzy for the national press who seem, almost as one, to have decided that the UK police service needs to be 'put in its place.' Meanwhile two victims of crime who were fervently 'pro- police' are now perhaps just a little less so.

By Friday evening, the town, always vibrant at weekends, began to throb with music not just from the Yacht Haven stage but the bands that were performing in many of the welcoming pubs stationed along the quirky Cowes High Street.

Doubtless when the worst happens, be it in weeks, months or years, we'll again have to suffer crocodile tears and bold statements from a government that will nevertheless be held responsible by the front line law enforcement community for its failures, as set out above.